Welcome to the BettingChoice Horse Racing Blog. Here you'll find all the tips, insights and opinions for the world's biggest races including: Cheltenham, Breeders' Cup, Dubai Racing, the Grand National and more.
The July meeting is ready to get underway this week (even though it won't officially be July...) and the Saturday card at Newmarket plays host to some high quality thoroughbred racing action. The early going is said to be soft and we are still awaiting the final declaration stage so sorting through some deep cards is currently the order of the day.
Some high-quality runners will be on-track this Saturday. Expect a few sunny intervals in the build-up to Saturday so slightly firmer going shouldn't be completely unexpected.
Akeed Mofeed can be backed at around 16/1 and only missed out on his stakes debut by half a length. He will be lining up for his seasonal debut and John Oxx wouldn't have pointed him towards this one if he didn't think it he would at least have a chance and so the question mark over top of him is – just how much has he improved? He's been off-track since last September and will have put on a lot of mass and matured mentally as well.
We're just a few short days away from the 2012 Dubai Duty Free Irish Derby, a Group 1 encounter for entire colts and fillies. Keep your geldings at home, gents. There is a lot to like about this race and it has produced some real quality runners over its prestigious history.
It looks like this will be Camelot's next effort and he has scared away the bulk of the competition as only a solitary contender trades at a single digit price alongside him. Camelot's impressive run of form now has him undefeated in four races with over a million in earnings already. Sent off as the favourite in every...
The latest leg of the Global Sprint Challenge has even more international appeal this time as Australian super mare Black Caviar has ventured to English shores for what is set to be he first first away fixture. Taking the show on the road after dominating race after race in her native land, Black Caviar is now well-backed to defeat the best line-up of sprinters that Europe has to offer.
After a scintillating performance from Frankel in the opening race on day one, it will certainly be up to Black Caviar to put together a masterclass to steal the show on the final day of racing at Royal Ascot. Expect some stiff...
It's been a rollicking two days at Royal Ascot with two stand-out performances punctuating the 12 races run so far. Frankel, a true living legend, got things off with a bang in the Queen Anne Stakes to romp home by 11 smashing lengths in what many are saying is the greatest performance ever rated by modern handicappers.
As if that wasn't enough, we've then had New Zealand-bred So You Think pulling off a stellar Group 1 victory in the Prince of Wales Stakes over a valiant Carlton House, who was running in her majesty's colours.
We've got a solid fund lined up for this weekend's Scoop6 Jackpot with a single selection in play for the bonus fund this week. £193,505 is sitting in the win fund with £82,930 up for grabs in the bonus fund. An interview with last week's solitary winner confirmed that he's now mortgage free and that s lengthy vacation would be in store following a bonus victory.
Swing Bill seems to be getting a lot more respect than he did in the National. Exchange prices floated for him were around 300.0 and he actually managed to finish the race – one of the relative few to do so this year.
Connections obviously think he's capable of running well and acquitting himself properly in this one and his 16/1 price will probably drift up a bit unless he makes a genuinely nice pre-race appearance.
Tullamore Dew is in the mix for this one as well and he looks to be firmly planted in each-way territory, trading at a relatively solid 25/1. Despite not much success in the past year or so he remains towards the top end of...
We've got a cracking field of 20, many coming directly out of the Grand National at Aintree, to tackle the latest iteration of the Bet365 Gold Cup. The longer distance chase isn't quite the testing encounter that the National is but it remains a serious kingmaker with a hefty purse up for grabs at the business-end of the season.
A number of talented contenders are set to contest this one with Tidal Bay going in as the top weight, representing the Paul Nicholls yard. Winless this season, the eleven-year-old son of Flemensfirth faces a tricky handicap here but will be under the confident guidance of Daryl Jacob.
The 6:05 is a bumper race with some extremely lightly-raced four and five-year-olds. This one is really anyone's guess so it's probably one to watch for some last minute price drops. First To Boogie somehow fell in his last race and I'm not even sure he was actually going over obstacles. Either way, he took plenty of money to go off as the 2/1 favourite against a field of nine.
Willy Mullins will saddle Goldboy while Henry De Bromhead has Zane Grey lining up in this one and he was brought down on debut when taking a spin at Kilworth last month.
The Grade 1 Growise Champion Novice Chase sees Sir Des Champs boasting a tremendous...
The third race is the 4:55 and it's a handicap hurdle going 2m over the going, which should still be rated soft at this point. The field for this one has just been clipped down to 28, which is still lengthy but far from the 48 runners who were still in the mix yesterday before the most recent withdrawal stage. People who follow the Irish National Hunt closely will be able to make a bit more sense of this one but there are a number of beaten favourites coming into this one.
The highest-weighted is Citizenship, who was last seen finishing well-beaten in the Vincent O'Brien at Cheltenham. Prior to that he had looked quite good at Leopardstown, capturing a score in late January and finishing a close second two days after Christmas.
